wards them, shaking back his long fair hair
with his old favorite gesture and laughing in apparent glee. Then he
suddenly raised his arms, and, clasping his hands together, poised
himself as though he were some winged thing about to fly.

"Sigurd! Sigurd!" shouted Gueldmar, his strong voice tremulous with
anguish. "Come back! come back to Thelma!"

At the sound of that beloved name, the unhappy creature seemed to
hesitate, and, profiting by that instant of irresolution, Errington and
Lorimer rushed forward--Too late! Sigurd saw them coming, and glided
with stealthy caution to the very brink of the torrent, where there was
scarcely any foothold--there he looked back at his would-be rescuers
with an air of mystery and cunning, and broke into a loud derisive
laugh.

Then--still with clasped hands and smiling face--unheeding the shout of
horror that broke from those who beheld him--he leaped, and fell! Down,
down into the roaring abyss! For one half-second--one lightning
flash--his twisted figure, like a slight black speck was seen against
the wide roseate glory of the tumbling cascade--then it disappeared,
engulfed and lost for ever! Gone,--with all his wild poet fancies and
wandering dreams--gone, with his unspoken love and unguessed
sorrows--gone where dark things shall be made light,--and where the
broken or tangled chain of the soul's intelligence shall be mended and
made perfect by the tender hands of the All-Wise and the All-Loving One,
whose ways are too gloriously vast for our finite comprehension.

"Gone, mistress!" as he would have said to the innocent cause of his
heart's anguish. "Gone where I shall grow straight and strong and brave!
Mistress, if you meet me in Valhalla, you will love me!"

CHAPTER XVII.

"Do not, I pray you, think evilly of so holy a man! He has a sore
combat against the flesh and the devil!"--_The Maid of Honor_.

The horror-stricken spectators of the catastrophe stood for a minute
inert and speechless,--stupefied by its suddenness and awful rapidity.
Then with one accord they hurried down to the level shore of the
torrent, moved by the unanimous idea that they might possibly succeed in
rescuing Sigurd's frail corpse from the sharp teeth of the jagged rocks,
that, piercing upwards through the foam of the roaring rapids, were
certain to bruise, tear, and disfigure it beyond all recognition. But
even this small satisfaction was denied them. There was no sign of a
floating